Sudan's internationally recognized army-backed government, which is led by General Abdel Fattah Burhan, has been trying to present a situation of normalcy in the war-torn country's capital, Khartoum.
The international airport in Khartoum received its first scheduled flight in more than two years on Sudnday.
The flight from the eastern Red Sea city of Port Sudan brought 160 passengers, including the country's caretaker Prime Minister Kamil Idris, and was hailed as the symbolic return of the government.
In April 2023, a power struggle over the integration of the paramilitary Rapid Support Forces, or RSF, into the Sudanese Armed Forces, or SAF, escalated into war. The RSF managed to gain control of the capital, which prompted the army-backed government to relocate to Port Sudan some 700 kilometers (435 miles) from Khartoum.
But in March 2025, the Sudanese Armed Forces managed to largely regain control of the capital.
Since then, around 1.3 million people — of 3 million who fled fighting in Khartoum in 2023 — have returned to the capital, according to the International Organization of Migration, or IOM.
After almost three years of war, Sudan's international airport has reopened in February 2026Image: Mohamed Khidir/Xinhua/picture alliance
"The Sudanese government has been trying very hard to promote a narrative that Khartoum is safe to return to," Hamid Khalafallah, an independent a Sudanese policy analyst, said.
"There is obviously a positive side as people who have been displaced return to their houses," he told DW.
But there was also dishonesty associated with the narrative that Khartoum was safe, he warned.
"The lack of fighting in the capital does not equal security," he said.
The heavy clashes that took place between April 2023 and March 2025 have damaged basic services, such as access to potable water or electricity networks, and many areas are not yet cleared of mines, the United Nations Mine Action Service (UNMAS) has warned.
On Khartoum's main commercial street, Liberty Street, only a few shops have reopened so far. This week, the tea-seller Halima Ishag told the news agency AFP that business was not good.
"The neighborhood is still empty," the 52-year-old mother of five said. Her income in the past two weeks was around 5,000 Sudanese pounds (€2 or $2.40), which is a third of her pre-war income.
"A further problem with this narrative is that it signals that the job is done and the war is over," Khalafallah said. "But that disregards the parts of the country where the war is continuing and the suffering of the people is immense."
Despite the return of the government to Khartoum, the war continues in other provinces with no end or ceasefire in sight. This has also prompted the world's largest displacement crisis with up to 14 million people internally and externally displaced.
Fighting has so far killed up to 250,000 people. Accurate or updated figures are not available as clashes continue, satellite-based internet communication is curbed, and many international aid organizations and observers have left the country after repeated attacks.
Khartoum's international airport was heavily shelled between April 2023 and March 2023, while other parts of the city remain damaged. Image: Mohammed Nzar Awad/Anadolu/picture alliance
Kordofan now the epicentre of the Sudan war
Fighting is ongoing in Kordofan, the last state region that separates army-held territories in the north and the center, including Sudan's capital Khartoum, and RSF-controlled areas in Sudan's western Darfur region and parts of the south.
On Tuesday, the Sudanese Armed Forces stated that their forces had broken a siege by the RSF and its allied SPLM force of the city of Kadugli, the capital of South Kordofan, where famine was declared in November 2025.
A day earlier, the army said it had broken the siege of al-Dalanj, one of the largest cities in South Kordofan, and last week, the siege of Dilling, a town some 130km north of Kadugli.
"The recent takeovers of Dilling, al-Dalanj and Kadugli in Kordofan are hailed as potential watershed moments for the SAF but it may be just part of the minutia of the war," Hager Ali, a Sudan researcher at the German think tank GIGA Institute for Global and Area Studies, cautioned.
"The SAF, just like the RSF, are stretching resources to fight many fronts, so winning back is one thing but being able to hold that territory is another," she said, highlighting that this region matters to both of the warring factions.
"For the SAF, it is a key route for supply lines," Ali said. "For the RSF, the region matters due to its border with South Sudan where infrastructure for arms trafficking is established, gum arabic is traded and oil pipelines cross into Sudan."
Analysts have long warned that Sudan is in danger of splitting into two countries with rival governments backed by foreign powers.
Despite repeated denials by the United Arab Emirates, it is widely seen to be the main backer of the Rapid Support Forces and their leader General Mohammed Hamdan Dagalo, who is also known as Hemedti.
Egypt and Turkey are firm supporters of the SAF-backed government led by General Abdel Fattah Burhan.
The United States has imposed sanctions on both the RSF and the SAF.
Last week, EU foreign policy chief Kaja Kallas also said that new sanctions against members of the RSF and the SAF had been adopted.
"These measures alone will not end the war, but they will raise the cost for those responsible," she said.
The humanitarian situation in Kordofan is getting worse, international aid organizations warnImage: El Tayeb Siddig/REUTERS
Difficulty reaching people in needs as Sudan crisis deepens
Meanwhile, the humanitarian situation is dire.
"What we're seeing is not a frozen crisis, but a rapidly deepening one," Bob Kitchen, director of Emergency Preparedness and Response at the International Rescue Committee, told DW on Monday.
"Millions of people are facing emergency levels of food insecurity, and children are arriving at clinics severely malnourished, many already weakened by disease and lack of clean water," he said, warning that despite rising needs, Sudan is slipping out of the global spotlight.
More than 1,000 days into the conflict, aid for Sudan remains largely underfunded. As of January 2026, only 35% of the needed $2.9 billion (€1.75bn) for Sudan's Humanitarian Needs & Response Plan 2026 were covered, according to the latest UN Humanitarian Overview.
"I've just spent five days in South Kordofan in Sudan where the worst hunger catastrophe within Sudan rages," Jan Egeland, the secretary general of the Norwegian Refugee Council, told DW.
"The forces around the cities did not let us bring in any humanitarian relief," he said.
He warns of "an epic biblical disaster" in three months time when the rainy season starts, making it impossible to move large quantities of food or other relief into the Kordofan area.
He urged the international community "to not turn your back on the women and children who have fled from starvation and war, and now hope for some international solidarity."
Curated by Marcus Thompson
